


how far you will go

by angstics



Category: Dreamer Trilogy - Maggie Stiefvater, Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: An Attempt (tm), Character Study, Driving, F/F, Hand Touch, Post-CDTH, also u cowards!!! write carliana fic!!!, i really wanna learn more about them
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-19
Updated: 2020-01-19
Packaged: 2021-02-27 11:20:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 953
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22076086
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/angstics/pseuds/angstics
Summary: Farooq-Lane is driving Liliana to their cottage after the confrontation with the rouge Zeds.The way she spoke told Farooq-Lane many things despite only knowing her for a few days. One, she was careful with her words, only saying them if she really meant them. Two, she rarely spoke about herself. Three, when she spoke, Carmen couldn’t focus on anything else.
Relationships: Carmen Farooq-Lane/Liliana
Comments: 10
Kudos: 32





	how far you will go

**Author's Note:**

> im just so in love with my cdth women. ESPECIALLY these gfs!!

Skip, hop. Follow the white rabbit. That was Farooq-Lane’s life for the past few months.

Except, now, a soft-touched dream followed her everywhere. _Liliana_ was her name. No last name, no family. Even Parsifal had a family. The thought sent shivers down her fingers, like a sudden wind had gone through their car.

Farooq-Lane focused on the dark road she was riding. It was a lonely, easy path, one made for those who didn’t care about time. She was not one of those people but she was forced onto it as their destination only had one streetway connecting it to the rest of the world. It’s a long drive, and then when they got there it would be just her and the Visionary as the Moderators hunted down the runaway Zeds. Apparently, that wasn’t something that required Farooq-Lane’s immediate help. “Take the Visionary away from the public,” Lock had said. “Then we’ll call you.” She hated that she was sidelined, especially now that she had found another Visionary. But she can wait. She can wait.

“Carmen,” Liliana whispered. Liliana began to call her by her last name around the Moderators but dropped it as soon as they were alone. Farooq-Lane somehow didn’t have the inclination to tell her otherwise. “Is something bothering you?”

The way she spoke told Farooq-Lane many things despite only knowing her for a few days. One, she was careful with her words, only saying them if she _really_ meant them. Two, she rarely spoke about herself. Three, when she spoke, Carmen couldn’t focus on anything else.

Liliana’s red hair was nestled into her forearms and chest, as if it were a blanket. She herself looked bothered, from the nervous energy she passed her hands through her locks to the shadow deepening her eyebrows. Liliana had something to say and she was holding back, waiting for Farooq-Lane to speak up first.

“No. Not right now,” Farooq-Lane eventually replied. She shrugged herself onto her seat, trying to relax the knot in her shoulders. The truth was she wasn’t. Despite her frustrations towards Lock and the ever-present anxiety about the future, Farooq-Lane felt fine at that moment.

With the moon resting in the corner of her eye, light lazily falling on the ground, and the quiet of night lulling her forward, she didn’t feel much of anything. The silent presence of someone as calming as Liliana didn’t hurt either. Were all Visionaries that mood-altering? Parsifal brought out her annoyance and rage, Liliana brought out her gentleness and _want for more_.

There was no single word for that, was there? She wanted more. It was a sudden feeling. Farooq-Lane wanted more than this job, more than even her previous job. More than the end of the world, more than death at every corner.

More, more, more. What was _more_?

She glanced at Liliana from her periphere, who was looking at her with no shame. Skip, hop, that was what Farooq-Lane did. But all this strange creature had to do was _do_.

“I somehow don’t believe that.” Liliana pulled her legs up to her chest, tightly knitting together her body. Her hands transferred to her pants, soothing the fabric. She was beautiful. It was so easy to think. It was more than her fair hair and upturned, pink lips and soft edges, although those features were so clear in her mind’s eye already. It was the way she carried herself like she truly knew who she was, like she was sure of how the world worked. Farooq-Lane was desperately trying to find that same realization, replacing the empty space with a straight smile and a spotless blazer. Was there no _something more_ without that sense of self first?

Farooq-Lane was so tired. She parked in the middle of the road and rubbed her eyes shut. She felt nothing. “Believe what you want. It doesn’t matter.”

“Everything matters in the end,” Lillian said, Delphic in its wording but well-meaning in its intent. “Oh, Carmen Farooq-Lane. How far you will go.”

Shivers sent her ablaze again, not of the hair-raising kind this time but of the chest-in-fire kind.

Then Liliana did something she’d done before. The back of her hand brushed Carmen’s hand on the steering wheel. It was a soft touch but it carried a cloud of young uncertainty.

There was something.

Carmen wasn’t sure if it came from her or from Liliana or from how fast the touch had come then gone. Carmen saw the way Liliana diverted her eyes after, a distant thing playing behind her long eyelashes. Liliana lived in the infinite, gray matter between now and later, memories of someone she wasn’t and someone she always was in her brain. How did she survive until her hands were wrinkled and her hair dull? Carmen could barely be one of herself.

Carmen held still. Liliana’s warmth had dissipated by the time the quiet was broken.

“Let’s keep going. The world awaits,” Liliana concluded. She spoke as if she’d discovered a new corner of a well-explored universe and it disappointed her. Her sadness enveloped Farooq-Lane’s world. Moonlight became washed; shadows became ghosts.

Okay, Farooq-Lane must’ve said, although she couldn’t remember saying it, because that was what she said when she was afraid and alone and confused of any other option.

They drove until a cottage came into view. Dawn painted it pink. Liliana got out first, walked to the grass surrounding the guarded property, and laid under a tree on the front yard. Farooq-Lane had nothing to say so she watched from inside the car, suit pressing into her arms. She imagined how Liliana’s hand would look in her own, properly conjoined. Both the action and the feeling were something new. Something more.

**Author's Note:**

> comments, kudos, bookmarks all make me v happy. thank you for reading.


End file.
